


Honoria and the Cipher of Jeeves

by implicated2



Category: Jeeves & Wooster, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
Genre: Consent, D/s, F/F, Femslash, Humor, Indeterminacy, Meta, negotiation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-18
Updated: 2012-05-18
Packaged: 2017-11-05 13:42:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/407081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/implicated2/pseuds/implicated2
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>What happens when kinky ladies project their desires onto a certain gentleman and valet? </i> </p>
<p>Honoria Glossop and her friend Daphne Braythwayt suspect there's more between Bertie Wooster and his valet Jeeves than meets the eye. But between Bertie's rhapsodic ramblings and Jeeves' practiced mask, it's difficult to get to the heart of the matter.  Then again, when there are amorous adventures to be had among friends, does the heart of the matter really, well, matter?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Honoria and the Cipher of Jeeves

**Author's Note:**

> Rated E for explicit depictions of consensual D/s and s/m, including begging, orgasm control, impact play with objects, gags, and fisting, generally presented in a lighthearted, character-driven sort of way. If you're not sure whether this is your thing, the first few paragraphs can give you a general idea.
> 
> Beta'd by a generous friend (if friend is what you call a person who reads your stories, writes you notes, and discusses them with you over tea) who currently lacks a usable internet handle.
> 
> Oh, and the Jeeves/Bertie tag is misleading. It should be "possible Jeeves/Bertie."

In her room in Ditteridge, Daphne Braythwayt lay back in her bed, naked and belly-up. Her arms were stretched out above her head, wrists bound together by a tasteful beige scarf, and her legs were spread to either side like a pair of open scissors. Her friend Honoria Glossop—if  friend is what you call the person who's bound your arms, kicked apart your legs, and is currently laying into your sensitive inner thighs with the sole of a ladies' riding boot—knelt above her, wielding said boot in hand and savoring Daphne's gasps, yelps, and pleading expression with a certain hard gleam in her eye and shortness of breath that made her partner all the more willing to yield. 

Swinging the shoe with increasing vigor, Honoria paused to admire the red blotches her blows left behind. After a few last hits, she lowered her weapon, leaning just so against her friend's thigh as she placed the boot on the floor.

"You're all red," said Honoria, rising back up and regarding her friend the way she imagined a lion might regard a particularly delicious wildebeest.

"Am I?" Daphne's eyes had the glazed expression they got from enduring pain and from surrendering her body to the use of her capable and rather brilliantly sadistic companion.

"Does it hurt?" She traced her finger along the red marks she'd created.

Daphne nodded dreamily.

"Does this?" She grabbed a handful of mottled thigh, digging in her short, sharp nails, and was treated to a lurch and a yowl in response.

Honoria caught her friend's eye, smiling dangerously, and without letting go of the thigh or the desperate gaze, she brought her other hand up between her friend's legs and ran a pair of fingers just inside her gratifyingly slick lips. She brought the fingers to the light and examined them, half wondering, half cruel.

Daphne's eyes followed her friend's fingers, quite mesmerized. "More, please," she breathed.

Honoria's grin broadened. She enjoyed giving her friend what she wanted, but denying her what she urgently demanded was a particularly exquisite pleasure. " _Please_?" she echoed airily, still contemplating her two wet fingertips.

"Please," Daphne repeated, her breath coming in gasps. "I want more. Please, miss." Her eyes widened as she added the honorific. She was a perfect puddle of sweat, need, and desire.

Honoria frowned. The pair had been discussing their desire for a mode of address that would, at key moments, emphasize Daphne's subservience, but  _miss_ didn't feel quite right. It was rather too much like being addressed by a servant. Still, it was hard to resist her friend's earnest pleas, particularly when giving into them would produce such a stirring result. 

"Very well." Honoria swung one leg over Daphne's thigh, lying half beside her friend, half over her, and caught a handful of hair in her left hand. She pulled so that Daphne was facing her directly, angled her own thigh just between Daphne's legs, and then placed the two wet fingertips of her right hand against her friend's half-open mouth.

Wordlessly, Daphne took the fingers in, as Honoria began to press her thigh rhythmically against her. They lost themselves in it, Daphne licking and sucking and thrusting and moaning, Honoria's thigh and fingers pushing relentlessly in, her hawklike gaze never leaving her friend's glazed and grateful eyes.

Presently, a moan alerted Honoria that her friend was near her release, and she sped up her thigh thrusts, drinking in each gasp, shriek, and whimper as if it were her own, which, in a sense, it was.

Finally, Daphne cried out and writhed against her, her mouth wide, the fingers inside it released. She fell back limply, and Honoria stroked her hair, wrapping her strong arms around her friend's soft, naked form, and they lay there together, flushed and sated and catching their breath.

 

It was in discussing the interlude I have just described—and in particular Daphne's use of the appellation  _miss—_ that the two ladies hit upon a point of disagreement. The friends were in the habit of dissecting and examining their amorous encounters, which served both to extend the enjoyment of previous encounters and to hit upon new means of enjoyment for the future. In conversations like these, they had first learned that Honoria preferred to take control, that Daphne preferred to cede it, and that Daphne particularly liked being fucked—on that word, at least, they could agree—with the whole of a partner's hand. It was not unusual for the pair to differ on a matter of taste; what surprised Honoria now was that their disagreement concerned something—some _one_ —else entirely.

"You beg splendidly, dear," Honoria said, gracing her companion with a quick kiss to the ear. "But I'm still not certain  _miss_ is the word for it." 

Daphne sighed. She rather agreed, but the two of them were running out of options. The last time they'd had this conversation, they'd ruled out  _Madam_ (too matronly),  _Mistress_ (too sordid),  _Milady_ (too feudal), and  _Miss Honoria_ (too many syllables). A simple  _miss_ had seemed the best of the lot.

"I wish they made a guidebook for this kind of thing," Honoria mused. "Someone's got to have come up against this matter before."

Daphne seemed to contemplate this for a moment, then asked, "What about that ex-fiancé of yours, the one with the clever valet?"

"What, Bertie Wooster?" Honoria was genuinely taken aback.

"And... Jeeves, is it?"

Honoria nodded slowly. "Yes, that's right."

"Well, what word do you suppose they use?"

"Why,  _sir_ , of course," said Honoria, still puzzled. "Haven't you heard him? 'Indeed, sir,' 'Very good, sir,' 'I think you're an ass but I'm too polite to say so, sir.'"

Daphne giggled. "I don't mean Jeeves, Honoria. I mean Bertie." When her friend didn't respond, she continued, "In bed, Honoria. What do you suppose Bertie calls Jeeves  _in bed_ ?"

Honoria laughed heartily, looking fondly at her friend. "Oh, Daphne. You are funny."

"I'm quite serious," Daphne replied.

It took Honoria a few moments to respond. "Are you suggesting," she finally managed, "that Bertie Wooster and his valet are _lovers_?"

Daphne smirked back at her. "Are you suggesting they're not?"

Honoria found herself quite stymied in response. It crossed her mind that during the time when she'd found herself engaged to Bertie, she'd comforted herself with the thought that he might at least be amenable to his wife's taking charge in certain marital affairs. But his valet? Certainly Bertie Wooster had more scruples than that, if not more sense.

"I hardly think—" she began, but broke off, still quite out of sorts. She had never liked Jeeves. It was her opinion that the man got Bertie out of entirely too many scrapes that he quite well deserved to be  _in_ . But she had to admit, upon reflection, that the images presented to her by the scenario Daphne had suggested were not entirely unpleasing: Jeeves drawn up to his full height, one of his own shoes pushing against Bertie's bare, willowy chest. Jeeves, fully clothed and pressed, bent over his naked, howling master. It was all rather distracting, but it was a fantasy, nothing more.

"Oh, think about it," said Daphne. "Two men, living together, obviously devoted to one another..."

"One of whom is a  _servant_ ," protested Honoria. "Suppose Jeeves  _did_ take him as a lover. How would Bertie know he wasn't just trying to 'give satisfaction' or whatever it is he's always saying?"

"So what if he is? He's entirely too clever to let Bertie push him into anything he didn't want himself."

"Well, what about feelings?" asked Honoria, wrapping her arm affectionately around her friend.

"Oh, what about them," said Daphne dismissively, leaning in closer. "They're obviously mad about each other."

"It's not obvious to  _me._ " But the more Honoria thought about it, the less she knew what to think. It would be an unusual arrangement, yes, but Daphne was right: Jeeves was far too clever to embroil himself in relations with his master without wanting to, or without a clear way out. And there was something so charmed and sunny about Bertie; if anyone could pull off a  _liaison_ between master and servant that turned out all right in the end, it might well be he. Besides, Jeeves did manage most of Bertie's affairs already. How many steps was it from fixing and breaking up matches among Bertie's circle to, say, grabbing him by the collar and leading him roughly into the  _boudoir_ ? As Honoria contemplated the matter, she began to think it all quite plausible, if plausible is the word for a thought that makes a self-possessed woman go all flushed and short of breath. 

"Well, Daphne," she said finally, "I do believe Bertie and Jeeves will be at that engagement party Dahlia Travers has invited us to next Saturday. Perhaps we'll see for ourselves."

 

Seeing for themselves, however, proved to be a good bit more complicated than either had predicted.

"He wouldn't stop waxing poetic about Jeeves," Daphne reported to Honoria on their first day at Brinkley Court. "If I never hear the word 'paragon' again, I shall die happy. And yet, he didn't really  _say_ anything."

Honoria was not particularly surprised; she'd had her own share of utterly inscrutable conversations with Bertie Wooster. What did surprise her, however, was her own subtle but palpable sense of disappointment. Ever since Daphne had first suggested that an unorthodox connection might exist between master and valet, Honoria's mind had been busy inventing scenarios for the pair, and it was rather a letdown to remember that, outside of her imagination, Jeeves and Bertie at the very least kept up appearances.

"Oh, there was some matter of a tie," Daphne continued. "Magenta or fuchsia—one of those pink colors. Jeeves didn't like it, but Bertie had it round his neck, proud as could be. It sounded a bit more heated than one's usual dispute about neckwear, but that's not much to go on, really."

"Well, maybe asking directly isn't the answer," said Honoria. "Maybe—"

Daphne clapped a hand onto her friend's arm. In a rather loud, forced tone, she said, "Oh, there's Jeeves now."

Honoria turned her head sharply to see the very valet they had been discussing. He was attentively polishing a candlestick, having apparently glided into the room soundlessly at some point during their conversation. Honoria wondered how much he had overheard.

Jeeves inclined his head toward the two ladies. "May I be of assistance, Miss Braythwayt? Miss Glossop?"

The pair looked at each other guiltily. Jeeves was, as always, the picture of formality and politeness. At last, Honoria came out with, "We're looking for a word, Jeeves."

"A word, miss?"

Daphne looked at Honoria uncertainly. It was only when Honoria added, "For showing respect," that she remembered their earlier conversation.

"Very good, miss," said the valet. "To what manner of person does one wish to show respect with this word?"

The two women looked at each other once again, each conscious of Jeeves standing before them, mild but expectant.

"A superior," Daphne finally managed, at the same moment that Honoria blurted out, "A friend."

"Ah," said Jeeves, and Honoria thought she saw one of his eyebrows go up just the tiniest fraction of an inch. "It may perhaps be illuminating, ladies, to examine the practices of the ancient Greeks. The historian John Addington Symonds writes—"

"Oh, besides the ancient Greeks," interrupted Daphne, who was not about to start calling her friend Aphrodite or Sappho or what-have-you.

"One might perhaps emulate certain philosophers—"

"We thought," Honoria cut in delicately, "That you might have some expertise in the matter."

"I am honored by the sentiment, Miss Glossop."

"Some firsthand expertise," Daphne prompted.

"Your regard for my experience is most flattering, Miss Braythwayt," Jeeves responded easily, his face maddeningly placid.

"Oh, hang it all, Jeeves," said Honoria. "Do you know what we're asking or not?"

"It is my understanding, Miss Glossop," the valet said coolly, "that you seek a certain word. If the suggestions I have made are not to your liking, I'm afraid I can be of no further assistance."

It was for moments like this one, Honoria mused, that she could not stand Jeeves. The valet had seen through her completely and revealed nothing of his own in return. Or he hadn't, and that practiced nonchalance of his simply obscured his confusion at the two ladies' line of questioning. It wasn't that she'd expected him to admit anything outright, or that she'd pictured herself chummily holding forth with him on the pleasures of commanding a lover, but his utter unreadability made her feel both defeated and alone. So when Jeeves asked, after a moment's silence, "Will that be all, Miss Glossop?" Honoria had little left to give but a gloomy response in the affirmative.

 

Their next move was Daphne's idea. If there did exist any out-of-the-ordinary relations between Jeeves and Bertie, Daphne speculated, then perhaps the pair could be caught in a private moment. Daphne and Honoria would contrive to be alone with the master and valet, set a certain mood, and observe the effect.

They had been hoping for an outdoor activity, but owing to a torrential downpour that took hold that night and seemed reluctant to let up the following day, the ladies shifted their sights to a hand of cards. They discovered Bertie in the drawing room, brandy and soda in hand and garish pink tie round his neck, and invited him to join them, with Daphne hinting that perhaps—though it would be highly irregular—Jeeves could serve as their fourth.

"Topping plan," said Bertie, taking a long drink. He'd had a look rather like a cornered fox ever since the two ladies had put their invitation to him. "Of course, Jeeves is bally brilliant. He'll trounce the likes of us roundly."

"Bridge is a partnership game," Honoria laughed, clapping Bertie on the arm. "He'll hardly trounce  _you_ ."

Bertie rubbed his arm where Honoria's hand had fallen. "Rotten luck for you two, though."

"Oh, I don't mind losing," Daphne said breathily, "to the right sort of opponent. It's quite agreeable to be put in one's place sometimes, don't you think, Bertie?"

"Right ho," Bertie assented, though a bit less specifically than Daphne would have hoped. "Humility, what?"

"What makes you so certain you and Jeeves will win?" asked Honoria, still smarting from her conversation with the valet the day before.

"Honoria is quite good," Daphne added. "At cards. And at putting one in one's place."

"Yes, rather," agreed Bertie with a shudder. "But Jeeves..." he trailed off, staring rapturously at some bit of empty air between the two ladies. "He's rather a marvel, is what."

"Oh?" said Daphne, in what she hoped was a nonchalant sort of tone.

"An absolute corker of a specimen. There's no one like him."

"You have... a rather unusual relationship," Honoria ventured.

"Oh, quite," agreed Bertie. "One in a million, I always say."

Jeeves, with what one more inclined than Honoria to sing his praises might have called an impeccable sense of timing, appeared in the doorway.

"Jeeves!" Bertie exclaimed. "Are your ears... what do ears do when a chap's being talked about?"

"Burning, sir?"

"That's the one!" Bertie tugged idly at his tie, and Jeeves gave a barely perceptible wince in response.

"Am I to understand, sir, that you have been discussing me?"

"Right again, Jeeves," said Bertie, clearly impressed.

"We were hoping," Honoria explained, "that you would join us in a game of bridge."

"Bridge, miss?"

Honoria wondered perversely if the valet's habit of repeating one's words in a tone that made one feel quite absurd extended to matters amorous. She could almost picture the blighter removing his lips from his master's sensitive bits to imitate a moan ("Unngghh, sir?") with the same supercilious air. It was a neat trick, actually; she would have to borrow it for Daphne.

"Oh, do stay, Jeeves," said Bertie, with feeling. "It's awfully dreary just the three of us." He met Jeeves' eye, and something passed between the two of them that neither Honoria nor Daphne understood, though each speculated.

"Very good, sir," Jeeves said, and joined the party.

The problem, of course, with trying to set a mood during a game of bridge is that exchanging meaningful glances and surreptitious touches rather takes on the appearance of cheating at cards.

"I say," Bertie I-sayed, when one of Honoria's reaches under the table (she had put her hand on Daphne's knee and dug her fingernails into the skin all around) resulted in an involuntary yelp from Daphne. "That's rather unsporting, Honoria."

"Oh, I don't mind," said Daphne, whose eyes were already taking on a glazed look Honoria knew well.

A subtle cough emanated from the fourth corner of the table. "Mr. Wooster is under the impression, Miss Braythwayt, that Miss Glossop is conveying information to you regarding her hand."

"Nothing so serious as cheating, of course," said Bertie magnanimously. "Perfectly understandable, really. Can't get anywhere against Jeeves and me without a little extraordinary whatsit."

Honoria glared at him. She and Daphne had been winning on their own power (with the help of a bit of luck, but there was always luck in cards), and the insinuation that their success was illegitimate galled her.

"Even so," said Bertie,"No need to be so forceful. A gentle tap's as good as a hard whack, that's what I say."

"Do you?" Daphne purred. "I rather think a hard whack has its uses."

Nothing of a revelatory nature resulted from this observation, and the hand resumed. To Honoria's great satisfaction, her side prevailed even in the absence of certain misconstrued gestures, and Bertie was forced to concede that though Jeeves was "surely the brainiest cove that ever brained his way around a pack of cards," partnering with one B. Wooster was enough "to hold back even that most majestic of cerebrums, if cerebrums is the word I want." It was, and Jeeves' confirmation contained, to Honoria's hopeful ear, no small degree of fondness. Well, if he wasn't going to acknowledge her skill at bridge (and really, when did Bertie Wooster ever praise a woman's cleverness?), a little hint at depth between the man and his valet was decent consolation.

Daphne, however, wanted more than a hint, and took the rather brazen tack of bringing up childhood punishments. To Honoria's disappointment, however, Daphne's declaration that she enjoyed being caught at mischief ("it's rather a relief, don't you think, Bertie?") failed to elicit any telltale blushes or stammers. Worse, her broaching the subject of caning served more than anything to remind Honoria of an adventure the pair had shared several weeks prior. Neither Jeeves nor Bertie had appeared particularly moved by the topic, but Honoria found herself quite flushed at the memory and was sure that blasted valet saw the whole thing.

The upshot was that while their original plan ended with the pair suggesting it was a lovely afternoon for a nap, and wouldn't Jeeves and Bertie like to follow suit, the ladies became somewhat distracted. They never did manage to investigate whether Bertie had retired to his chamber with Jeeves in tow, so preoccupied were they with investigating each other, if investigate is what you call it when... well, best just to set the scene.

 

Checking to be sure that they were unobserved, Daphne followed Honoria to the latter's room. The moment she had locked the door, Honoria was upon her, backing her against the nearest wall. She grabbed a fistful of Daphne's hair and pressed a flat palm against her collarbone, then inserted a knee between her friend's legs and kissed her roughly, gaspingly, until both were quite altered.

"Did you really ask Bertie Wooster if he liked being caned?" Honoria marveled, still breathless from their kiss.

"I didn't say 'liked'," Daphne protested. "Ah!" (This last as Honoria dug a thumbnail into a fleshy bit just below the neckline of her dress.)

"You as good as said it." Honoria aimed the nail a quarter inch lower and took in her friend's gasp with a deep, savoring breath.

Daphne grinned mischievously at her partner. "You're the one who got us caught." Which, Honoria supposed, was true. Daphne had cried out, but Honoria knew how much pain Daphne could take without warning and remain stoic; that knee maneuver really had been a bit much.

"I thought getting caught was a relief," Honoria retorted, her thumb finding a new delicate spot.

Daphne inhaled sharply, letting out a long breath when Honoria let go. "It got us here, didn't it?"

Honoria sighed. "Here, where we have absolutely nothing new on Jeeves and Bertie?"

"Here," answered Daphne, "where I'm about to take my clothes off and you're about to have your way with me."

Honoria stood up a bit straighter. Well. There was certainly that.

A bit less sure of herself, Daphne continued, "May I? Take them off?"

If the request lost a bit of  _gravitas_ for the lack of that pesky, elusive word, Honoria barely noticed. "You may," she replied. And Daphne did.

"I wish I had that cane with me," Honoria mused as her friend undressed. "My hairbrush will have to do."

Daphne eyed her friend, both desire and hesitation clear on her face. "Won't someone hear us?"

Honoria retrieved the brush from her dressing table and turned it over between her fingers, admiring its base, a rounded rectangle of solid, black wood. "If anyone asks," she said, "I'll tell them I was brushing your hair. This lot'll believe I'm clumsy enough to have hit you by accident." She strode slowly back to her friend, now naked and seated on the edge of the bed, and brought the end of the hairbrush to Daphne's lips. "As for you"—she put her fingers in Daphne's hair and tilted her friend's head upward until the eyes met hers—"why don't you let me know when you'll need help staying quiet?"

As the two ladies were often obliged to perform their lovemaking discreetly, they had developed a sort of game: Daphne would endeavor to keep herself silent; Honoria would endeavor to make such silence impossible; and Daphne, when she found herself on the point of succumbing, would admit defeat and accept a glove or stocking or, once, the toe of a boot into her mouth to cry out against.

Daphne nodded, her eyes wide and reverent. Honoria removed the brush from her lips long enough to be sure her friend wasn't waiting to signal a pause in their play, then bade Daphne bend herself over the bed.

Honoria's first blows with the brush were the lightest. She covered Daphne's bottom and the backs of her thighs, stopping occasionally to press into her soft flesh or nudge apart her thighs with a dull corner of the brush's wood base. Her friend took the blows in stride; she was practiced at transforming much greater pain than this into a luscious wooziness and a slow breath out.

Soon, Honoria hit harder, resting one hand on Daphne's back to steady them both and to feel each gasp as it came. She was a circuit, one arm reverberating with each stinging smack, the other taking in her friend's sharper-by-the-minute breaths and starts. One particularly well-aimed hit elicited something that had the beginning of a cry to it, and Honoria leaned in beside her friend, a heady smirk playing on her reddening features. "Did you need something?"

Daphne shook her head vigorously, her lips pressed together.

"Very good," said Honoria, rising and launching a powerful  _thwack_ with the brush. Daphne jumped and inhaled sharply but kept her voice silent.

"Impressive," said Honoria.

"Thank you." Daphne said serenely, barely jumping at the smack that directly followed her words. "I knew you were going to do that."

Honoria continued with two more solid hits. "Be as smug as you like," she said airily. "We both know you always lose in the end."

"What, when you actually hurt me? I'd hardly call that losing."

"Oh, I have my ways," said Honoria, launching three more sharp shots in rapid succession.

"Good," said Daphne, her breathing a bit labored after that last set. "Use them."

So Honoria did. She struck her friend harder and faster with the solid wood hairbrush until her thighs and backside blushed a deep, hot red. She struck until her one arm was worn from the exertion, and the other had felt her friend jump, shudder, and suck in air, but still not give in. And then, finally, a sudden, sharp whack to the thigh brought a particularly quick inhalation, and before Honoria could launch her next offensive, Daphne hissed, "Wait!"

Honoria lowered the brush with relish. "Yes?"

"I'm ready."

" _Very_ good," Honoria replied, and fetched from her valise the same beige scarf that had so assiduously bound her friend's wrists a few nights earlier.

The scarf in place, Honoria launched her last few formidable whacks with the brush, enjoying her friend's muffled cries perhaps even more than Daphne enjoyed making them.

After allowing them both a few moments to recover, Honoria coaxed Daphne all the way up on the bed and onto her back, noting with pleasure that her friend's legs seemed to part for her in an almost involuntary gesture.

Honoria climbed onto the bed herself and removed the scarf from her friend's mouth. Placing her body over Daphne's, she kissed her forcefully, her tongue a weapon, the two fingers that found her friend's nipple and clamped down hard even more so. Their bodies pressed against each other, Honoria's dress against Daphne's bare skin, Daphne's hips yearning upward and Honoria's bearing down.

Presently, Honoria removed her mouth from her friend's and gazed down at Daphne's wet lips and wide eyes. This was where she wanted Daphne always, exposed and hungry and utterly under her control. She held their eye contact for a moment, and then, to her friend's surprise, she picked up the scarf from the bed, rose, and draped it over the dressing table.

"I'm going to need that scarf again," said Daphne, "when you fuck me."

Honoria had her reply ready. "When I fuck you, Daphne?"

She watched Daphne's expression as her friend made sense of her words. Daphne had long ago given her consent for Honoria to, at her discretion, deny her the pleasure of completion (such denials, both agreed, would highlight the power Honoria wielded over Daphne, besides which, begging seemed rather a dull charade when its conclusion was forgone), but it wasn't something Honoria often did. Faced with the prospect now, Daphne felt a mix of arousal and crushing disappointment.

"Please?" Daphne ventured, in a small voice. "Please fuck me?"

"No," said Honoria, sitting back down on the bed. "I should rather leave you wanting for now."

"Please," Daphne repeated, and she had the fleeting, helpless notion that if she could only plead her case better, she might get what she desired.

Honoria put a hand on her friend's cheek, suddenly gentle. "If you can't bear it, Daphne, you must tell me. Otherwise, the answer is no."

Daphne took a long, slow breath and met her friend's gaze. "I can bear it," she said.

"Good," said Honoria, with a cool smile. "I told you you'd lose in the end."

"And I told you," answered Daphne, "that I'd hardly call it losing. Even if I do hate you a bit at the moment."

"I can bear that," said Honoria, and kissed her friend on the forehead with a fond mix of tenderness and finality.

 

That night was the engagement party, a surprisingly action-packed affair. Two guests who seemed to have been quarreling sat together in an almost ostentatious harmony after the sudden and, to Honoria's mind, somewhat far-fetched revelation that Bertie Wooster had been responsible for a perceived slight between them. A pompous elder was humiliated, a new engagement was announced, and that French chef everyone always raved about truly did prepare a masterpiece of a meal. But regarding the matter most on Honoria and Daphne's minds, nothing surfaced. It was their last night at Brinkley Court, and the ladies had to admit that they hadn't found what they were seeking.

 

It was long after the party ended that Daphne, on her way to pay Honoria a late-night visit, crossed paths in a corridor with a certain unforthcoming valet. He strode so silently that when he first appeared in her field of vision, Daphne was quite startled. "Jeeves!" she exclaimed.

"Miss Braythwayt," he replied, in a tone suitably hushed for the hour, and continued his silent progress.

"Jeeves!" Daphne hissed, suddenly realizing where and when she had encountered him. She took quick stock of his appearance, hoping to catch a glimpse of mussed hair or a rumpled waistcoat, but nothing seemed out of place.

He stopped and turned toward her, inclining his head. "May I be of assistance, Miss Braythwayt?"

"You can tell me, Jeeves, what you're doing sneaking around the guest bedrooms in the middle of the night."

The valet remained unruffled. "There was a matter, Miss Braythwayt, that required my attention."

"Oh  _really_ ?" said Daphne, in a voice dripping with insinuation. "And what matter was that?"

He replied smoothly, "I'm afraid I'm not at liberty to say, miss."

"No, said Daphne, a smile creeping across her face. "No, I suppose you're not."

The two stood there for a moment in silence, Daphne triumphant, Jeeves, as always, unreadable. Finally, a soft cough emanated from the valet. "I have given some thought, Miss Braythwayt, to the matter you and Miss Glossop put to me the other day."

"Oh, really?" said Daphne. "Do go on."

"It is my opinion, Miss Braythwayt, that a well-placed 'sir' can be quite effective in smoothing relations."

"Well, yes, of course," said Daphne, a bit taken aback. "But what on earth has that to do with—" She broke off. Well, that was an idea.

 

And so, that night, when she found herself once again on her back in Honoria's bed, naked and wanting and captive to the bonds of that versatile beige scarf, Daphne supplicated herself with a quiet but distinct, "Please, sir?"

The effect upon Honoria was immediate. It wasn't that she felt herself more a  _sir_ than a  _miss_ (each had its place) or that she thought she'd always respond to  _sir_ this way (part of its power in the moment was in its novelty), or even that the word, to her, always seemed to express deference (she had a rather potent vision of Jeeves, in a position not dissimilar to her current one, asking the young master mildly if there was "anything you require, sir?"). And yet, there was something about the word tonight, some  _frisson_ of newness and rebellion, some none-too-subtle whiff of the gentleman and valet who'd been haunting her imagination of late, that was... what was that funny thing Bertie had said the other day?...  _just the ticket_ .

Honoria, whose fingers had been idly jaunting about that sensitive region between her friend's thighs, now took a handful of the little hairs there and pulled, eliciting a sharp hiss. "What was that?" she asked Daphne, her lips parted in a steely grin.

"Please, sir," Daphne repeated. "Please, Honoria. Please—"

Her friend rose from the bed. She opened her valise and rooted around inside. When she returned, she held in her hands an article in a deep pink hue.

"Is that—" Daphne began.

"Bertie's tie. I came across Jeeves attempting to destroy it and convinced him to let me take it from him."

"But how?"

Honoria threw up her hands, nearly tossing the tie in the air by accident. "It appears the man is more sympathetic to our cause than we might have guessed."

"Or he's not," said Daphne, "but he knew giving it to you would be enough to keep Bertie off the thing for good."

"Or that," agreed Honoria, and, after a moment's quiet reflection, added, "Well, open up then."

Daphne opened her mouth wide. Her friend inserted the garish pink necktie and then, lower down, a series of fingers, each more insistent than the last. If the cipher of Jeeves and Bertie nagged at them for a moment, it was swiftly lost among Daphne's lurches and tie-muffled gasps, Honoria's penetrating eye contact and the four—no, now five—matching fingers that pushed and opened and built into something vast and bold and all-consuming. This was it, thought Daphne, with all the thinking she could muster, _this_ , and Honoria, rapt and absorbed in her friend's every sound and breath and motion, thought  _this_ , and it swelled in them, joined them, and burst gloriously forth. It was enough, Daphne would conclude when they departed Brinkley Court the following morning, uncommonly tender with each other. It was enough, Honoria would think as she bade goodbye to Bertie Wooster and that maddening valet. They had not gotten what they'd come for—that, it seemed, would remain forever out of reach—but somehow, and perhaps in some part owing to the very gentleman's gentleman who had so eluded their scrutiny, the two friends returned home from their journey thoroughly satisfied.


End file.
